In the News

June 21, 2013 | The debate over the farm bill roiled the House this week, and crop insurance -- the new way to get money into farmers' pockets as direct payments are phased out -- figured as a key issue in the proceedings. Like the program or not, there's no denying that crop insurance firms have ramped up their political activity in recent years.

July 27, 2012 | LinkedIn comes to Washington, lobbying for the first time. The Campaign for Primary Accountability, though, is packing its bags, at least for this cycle. And a Republican lawmaker's leadership PAC takes folks to Disney World. Can we come next time?

July 12, 2012 | LPAC will back candidates of both parties as long as they support gay rights and abortion rights; a new "mission" for Santorum nonprofit; and the NAB still doesn't want to disclose info on political ads.

April 26, 2012 | At the outset, nobody thought Rep. Tim Holden, a 20-year Democratic incumbent from Pennsylvania, would have a competitive race in his 2012 bid to keep his seat for yet another term. But that was before the Campaign for Primary Accountability (CPA), a new super PAC, and other outside spending groups began to focus on the on the district.

June 15, 2011 | Instead of today, 76 House representatives will sometime this summer release reports on their stock, bond and mutual fund holdings, as well as investments in real estate, ownership interests in private companies and cash, according to a tally by the Center for Responsive Politics.

October 20, 2010 | Political action committees have funneled $72.6 million into the campaign coffers of Democrats competing in the country's most competitive races -- more than four times the amount PACs have donated to Republicans in these races, the Center for Responsive Politics has found.

June 29, 2010 | Although the clothing industry is pretty evenly divided overall, individual companies in the clothing manufacturing business tend to be notably partisan in their federal political donations, more so than almost any other industry.

October 16, 2009 | An initial Center for Responsive Politics analysis has found that sitting members of the U.S. House of Representatives raised $48.2 million from July 1 through Sept. 30, 2009, based on the 336 reports we have in. The mean amount these lawmakers raised was $143,640, and the median amount was $126,680.

October 8, 2009 | Rep. Jean Schmidt (R-Ohio) is one of the top recipients of money from Turkish-American groups. But the Ohio Election Commission has ruled that her 2008 third-party challenger David Krikorian made a false statement when he claimed Schmidt took money from "Turkish sponsored" political action committees.

June 25, 2009 | Here's a cool tool that brings together data from various parts of OpenSecrets.org to show how much money each current lawmaker has raised from various health-related industries and the health sector overall since 1989 (including President Obama's haul).

February 18, 2009 | As the story behind the embattled investment company Stanford Financial Group develops, we thought we'd take an even closer look at the seeds the company may have tried to plant in Washington via campaign contributions. When looking at ALL lawmakers to collect money from the company's PAC and employees (not just members of the current Congress), some additional, important names appear at the top of the recipient list.

February 17, 2009 | Money manager Robert Allen Stanford now has two things in common with embattled investment manager Bernard Madoff: both have come under scrutiny for allegedly defrauding their investors, and both have given significant funds to politicians. Between its PAC and its employees, Stanford Financial Group has given $2.4 million to federal candidates, parties and committees since 2000.

November 5, 2008 | The historic election of 2008 re-confirmed one truism about American democracy: Money wins elections. From the top of the ticket, where Barack Obama declined public financing for the first time since the system's creation and went on to amass a nearly two-to-one monetary advantage over John McCain, to congressional races throughout the nation, the candidate with the most money going into Election Day emerged victorious in nearly every contest.

September 24, 2008 | With few exceptions, incumbents will out-raise their challengers--so far this election cycle, incumbents for Congress have raised nine times more than their challengers, on average, and there is not a single Senate race where the challenger has raised more money than the sitting senator. Although challengers aren't winning the money race on the Senate side, the Center for Responsive Politics has identified 14 House races where the challenger surpassed the incumbent in fundraising after the most recent reporting period, through June.

September 11, 2008 | When the federal government announced two months ago that it would be seizing mortgage buyers Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, CRP looked at how much money members of Congress had collected since 1989 from the companies. On Sunday the government proceeded with the takeover and we've returned to our data to bring you the updates, this time providing a list of all 354 lawmakers who have gotten money from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (in July we posted the top 25).

February 3, 2006 | Mid-way through the ’06 House campaign, new FEC filings provide snapshot of money’s role By Center for Responsive Politics February 03, 2006 | Note: Figures provided in this story were those available days after the filing deadline of 1/31/06. At that time, the FEC had not yet completed their review of all committee filings. CRP…

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